by Max Brand
“Sure,” said Josiah wearily, for he had been exhausted in patience. “You can see it just as soon as you’ll tell me what’s on the side of it that’s turned to the card.”
“What d’you mean?” asked the other. “You think I’m trying to beat you out of that measly fob? Listen to me, partner. I’m Bill Ross of Crooked Creek, and anybody from that part of the country will tell you that I don’t have to go around swiping measly little fobs like that. But I’ll tell you this … if you’re asking about initials, the initials that ought to be on that fob are F. R., after my brother, Frank Ross.”
The pawnbroker had lifted his head and turned around full of interest at this narrative, but now his eyes darkened, and he shook his head. After all, this must be a far more aggressive claimant than the others had been, but beyond his aggressiveness he showed not the slightest proof that the fob was his or his brother’s.
“Maybe you’re Bill Ross,” he said dryly, “and maybe Frank Ross is your brother … and maybe he ain’t. But, anyway, if there are initials on that fob, they ain’t F. R. That’s final. You go hunting your brother’s fob some other place.”
The answer, however, was not the flush of shame or the brazen laugh with which most of the claimants had met their downfall at the hands of the sturdy little Watkins. Instead, Bill Ross flushed to his black eyes, and a branching vein stood out in the center of his forehead, so great was his anger.
“I’m here to stay,” he said. “You can lay to it that I take root right here till I get a look at that fob. Maybe the initials have been rubbed off, but I know that fob … and it used to belong to my brother.”
“All right, said the pawnbroker. “Just loosen up and tell me some of the other marks that let you recognize it.”
“By the hammer marks, for one thing,” answered Ross. “I hammered that fob out my own self. And I can tell it by the way the ring is made on top for the strap to go through. I ain’t any expert, but that was a smooth job … for me … and I remember it.”
Josiah Watkins rubbed his knuckles across his chin, and the stubble of a two-day’s beard rasped under the friction. There was a most convincing air to this claimant, he was forced to admit.
“That’s talking pretty strong,” he said. “But … well, when did your brother lose that fob?”
“Six weeks ago come tomorrow. No, seven weeks.”
Watkins shook his head. That could hardly be correct, if it related to the fob that young Charlie Mark had found and brought in. But his patience continued to last with the conversation, for there had been something extremely suspicious in the manner of Charlie Mark when he brought that fob to be shown in the window. Charlie was not in the habit of rising early to ride clear to town to execute such missions, and old Watkins had learned by careful inquiry, later, that no sooner was the fob disposed of than Charlie Mark turned his horse and rode back for the ranch of his adopted father as fast as he had ridden toward town.
“Seven weeks,” repeated Watkins, drumming on the top of the glass case and examining Ross with eager eyes. “And where did he lose it?”
“Over in Amazon Pass.”
“Amazon Pass?” Watkins shook his head. Had not Charlie Mark picked this fob up—or said he picked it up—on the road near his house?
“Why, you old idiot,” roared Ross, his face turning purple in a passion of anger, “don’t you suppose I’d ought to know? Wasn’t that the place where my brother was killed by that murderer, the Red Devil, and didn’t the Red Devil cut the fob off the strap that held it?”
“The Red Devil … you’re sure?”
“Sure? Didn’t I have to stand by with my gun on the ground and my hands in the air? Didn’t I have to stand by and see it done … see poor Frank go down, and see that devil lean over him and slash the fob away? Oh, cuss him. I know one thing, and that is that I’m going to live long enough to get back at him!”
His whole stout body shook with the passion of this statement, and then he held out his calloused palm.
“Gimme that fob. It might talk to me about the Red Devil and where to find him.”
“I’ll show you,” said Watkins, overawed in spite of himself by this display of emotion. “I’ll let you see for yourself. The initials can’t never be made into any F. R.”
He took the card from the window, removed the fob, and exposed the hitherto hidden side to the eyes of Ross.
The latter exclaimed in surprise and impatience, for the two deeply cut initials were most legibly engraved E. B. But suddenly he snatched the fob and cried out fiercely.
“Don’t run with that fob!” cried Watkins in warning. “I’ll raise the town first. You ain’t proved to my satisfaction that it belongs to you by rights. And you ain’t going to have more’n a look at it till you do prove what I’m waiting here to hear.”
“But I’m going to prove it. Look there … and there! Wasn’t that an F to begin with, and wasn’t it made into an E by cutting another line? Look close, and you’ll see that the lowest line wasn’t cut with the same sort of thing that was used to cut the other lines. And look at the bottom of the B, too. It was made like the lowest line of the E. The F and the R were cut in, and the other lines are stamped in, maybe with the end of a chisel, just the thing that a miner like Frank would be apt to use. D’you see? I tell you that used to read F. R., but it’s been changed into E. B. Can’t you see?”
Josiah Watkins, the color flooding out of his face, leaned low over the case, and stared as bidden. At length he took his trusty little microscope and with it continued the examination. There was no room for doubt. Different instruments had been used in the making of both letters.
He raised a wan and staring face.
“Next thing,” said Ross, trembling in excitement, “is who brung this here?”
“Partner,” said the pawnbroker, “I wish strongly that I never seen that fob. I thought from the first that they was something queer about him bringing it in the way he done, but I never dreamed … and it can’t be …”
“Gimme his name,” pleaded the miner. “That’s all I ask.”
“You know it. Everybody in these parts knows it. His name is Charlie Mark.”
It was a stunning blow to Bill Ross.
“Why, Watkins,” he said, “I ain’t accusing the gent that brung this fob here of having … having killed poor Frank. I ain’t such a fool that I’d accuse young Mark of being the Red Devil. But I sure am going out to ask him some questions.”
“If he’ll answer ’em. He’s proud as an eagle.”
“And I’m a bit prouder and a bit wilder right now. He’ll answer, right enough. You don’t have to worry none about that.”
He left the pawnshop with a rush and vaulted on to the saddled horse that stood with downward drowsing head in the street before the shop.
“He means business,” muttered the gaping pawnbroker, and he repeated as the miner leaned over the pommel, scooped up the reins, and drove home the spurs, “He means business. I wouldn’t be none surprised if this wound up in a gunplay of some kind or another. Something like that is due in Hampton … just about due.”
VII
Bill Ross had dropped the golden fob into the breast pocket of his shirt. It seemed as though the precious metal burned through to his heart and filled his veins with fire of hatred. He was on the trail of the murderer at last, he felt. And in his soul there was a wild prophecy of success. He would find the Red Devil, the murderer who all other men had failed to find in spite of their every effort.
So hotly did he spur out that dusty road that his horse was foaming from even that short distance when Bill Ross reached the Mark Ranch, flung himself from the saddle, and marched up the steps of the veranda. He saw before him a cheerful family group, so it seemed. There sat the white-headed Henry Mark, a man known far and wide through the mountains, whether in lumber camps, cow camps, or mines. Near him was a pretty-fac
ed girl that must be his daughter. Beside her was a lounging youth dressed with over-much care to be a Westerner. That, if reports spoke true, must be the foppish Charlie Mark.
Facing this family group, there was a man still hot from riding and dusty from the range—a brown-faced, handsome youth with features so strongly cut that in profile he seemed a man of thirty or some years more, and in full face he was seen to be only twenty-five. He was in the midst of a narrative of some sort connected with the range, perhaps, when the approach of Ross made him turn.
“Folks,” said Bill Ross, removing his hat to the girl, “I sure hate to walk in on you this way, but I got important business. My name’s Bill Ross.”
The old man rose. He remembered the name, he said. He was glad to meet Bill again, and, in the meantime, these were friends he must know. One by one the introductions were completed, and Bill Ross returned to the matter in hand, looking squarely into the face of Charlie Mark.
“Gents,” said Bill, “and lady, I got something to talk about that maybe you’ve seen before. That’s this.” And he exposed to them suddenly, in the palm of his hand, the golden fob.
His own eyes, however, did not remain fixed on the fob. They swept the circle of faces, and he saw Charlie Mark stiffen, and start, and then the glance of the youth flashed up and burned against his face for a keen moment.
Bill Ross blinked and stepped back a half pace. There was such suspicion, defiance, and shrewdness combined in that fiery glance that he dared not once accept all that was hinted in it.
A small voice cut through. “That’s the fob that Charlie wore when he come back. Ain’t it, Jim?”
Little Billy rose from nowhere and leaned on the back of Jim’s chair.
“Maybe. I dunno. Looks tolerable like a lot of other fobs that I’ve seen,” said Jim Curry negligently. “What about it, partner?”
The careless voice—the very careless voice—in connection with the rather dramatic manner in which Bill had displayed the fob, made Ross turn a frowning glance toward Curry, and he was met by a glance that was equally frowning, equally indifferent. A sudden thrill of thankfulness ran through Bill Ross that this was not the man with whom he was to have his dealings in the matter of the fob.
“I’ll tell you what about it,” said Bill Ross. “This here fob … I hear from Jo Watkins in town … was brung in a couple of weeks ago by Charlie Mark. Well, gents, the last time I seen it was on the watch of my brother, Frank Ross, when he was killed by the Red Devil up in Amazon Pass.”
Again he searched them, to see if anyone winced. It was not that he expected to find the criminal among them—but perhaps, who could tell?—there are strange ways of picking up clues. But this time Charlie Mark merely yawned.
“This sounds a little stagy to me,” he asserted. “What does it all lead to?”
“Hush, Charlie!” exclaimed Ruth Mark. “Can you speak to him in that way when his brother …?”
She stopped, the large, bright-eyed glance of Bill Ross rested upon her for a grateful and appreciative moment, then it returned to Charlie Mark as he pocketed the fob.
“I’d like to know,” he said, “where you found this fob.”
“In the road,” said Charlie.
And in his guilty heart he turned back and forth the question: was this the beginning of the end? Had not his premonition of danger, growing out of this fob, been justified? Here it was staring him in the face, practically accusing him. He must fence this man from the trail at once.
“What road?” asked Bill Ross.
“Look here!” exclaimed Charlie Mark aggressively. “What d’you mean by cornering me with questions like this? D’you think I’m the Red Devil?”
He leaned forward in his chair with a fighting light in his face. And Bill Ross was doubly amazed to see that the youngster apparently would prefer a battle to a continuation of the cross-examination. It only made his heart beat faster with the assurance that he had indeed come on the trail that led, however slowly, toward the truth to that detestable murder in the hold-up of the stage in Amazon Pass.
“I ain’t a fool,” said Bill Ross. “Of course, I don’t think you’re the Red Devil. But I’m trying to get at all you know about this fob. It may help us all to locate the Red Devil himself, and heaven knows the whole range wants that done bad enough.”
“I don’t like the way you go about it,” said Charlie Mark sullenly. “I don’t like your tone or your way of putting your questions. Try to speak like a man of breeding even if …”
“Charlie!” exclaimed Henry Mark, amazed. And he turned in his chair and regarded his adopted son with blank surprise.
“He’s trying to rile me, Mister Mark,” said Bill Ross, crimson to the eyes, “but he ain’t going to succeed. I’m here to stay until I find out what I can.”
“Answer him, Charlie,” commanded Henry Mark sternly, sitting up very straight in his chair. “Answer every question he puts to you. By heavens, Charlie, I’m surprised and ashamed to hear you speak as you have done.”
The jaw muscles of Charlie Mark bulged, and a little spot of passion appeared momentarily in the center of his cheeks.
“What road did you find it on?” repeated the questioner.
“This road.”
“When?”
“When I was coming home.”
Perspiration was pouring out from every inch of his body. He was only hoping that his face did not show his emotion too much.
“When you were coming home?” echoed Ross. “When was that?”
“A couple of weeks ago.”
“I want the exact day.”
“Well, two weeks ago last Saturday.”
“And you found the fob?”
“Yes. I’ve said that already.”
“Between here and Hampton?”
“I think so. Yes.”
“Why, Charlie,” broke in Little Billy, “ain’t it sort of funny that you could find a thing as little as that in the dark?”
Crimson swept at one leap over the entire face of Charlie Mark. “It was light when I saw it,” he managed to gasp out. And then he became conscious that every pair of eyes was fixed upon him with a horrible earnestness.
“It couldn’t have been light,” said the remorseless Little Billy. “It was a long pile after dark when you come sneaking up and …”
“You little snake!” growled Charlie Mark, and the back of his hard knuckles cracked across the mouth of the boy.
Little Billy reeled back against the wall of the house, and the next moment the hand of Charlie Mark was caught in a grip as of iron. He found himself inches away from the convulsed face of Jim Curry. For a moment he glared into that face whose lips were trembling over unspoken words, but Curry managed by a vast effort to control his fury, fling away the hand of Charlie, and go to Little Billy. The boy, white-faced but unflinching, gripped his hand and flashed up to him a single glance of admiration and trust. That was all.
Ruth Mark and her father were by this time on their feet. Only Charlie Mark himself was sitting. And it seemed to him that, by that brutal blow, he had betrayed himself utterly. He made a greater effort of mind than he had ever made in his life; that effort was a grip of the will to keep himself from bolting from the veranda and seeking refuge in flight.
“It was light when I started out from Hampton,” he said “and, when I was walking along, I kicked this fob out of the dust. I sat down to look it over. And … and … while I was there resting, it got dark. And there you are with your infernal mystery. Is that enough talk to suit you?”
“Not quite,” snapped Bill Ross.
The brain of Charlie Mark spun literally through a maze of darkness. What trap could be forthcoming now?
“What initials were on that fob?”
Frantically Charlie Mark thrust his thoughts back into the past. What were the cursed initials on th
e thing? E. B.? Or F. R.? An instant of reflection would have told him what was the original and what was the pair of initials to which he himself had altered it.
“The initials,” he said, “were F. R.”
And then he shut his teeth suddenly, seeing the eyes of Bill Ross grow wide. And he remembered. F. R. was the pair which he had changed. E. B. was what he should have said. He could see Bill Ross gaping, white with excitement and horror.
And then Ross spoke. “That’s enough, I guess … I dunno … My head’s spinning. I can’t believe what I’ve heard. But you”—and here a sudden thrill came into his voice—“you, Charlie Mark, know something about the Red Devil. You’ve seen him … you’ve been with him … because you got this fob out of his own hands, and he told you what initials was on it before he changed them himself.”
VIII
It was fate, indeed, thought Charlie Mark as he lifted his guilty eyes to the stern face of Bill Ross. One important fact filtered into his dazed brain—and that was that he had not been directly accused of being the Red Devil in person—only it was insinuated that he was in some manner connected with the terrible bandit. The accusation was almost as severe. To meet it he should summon an appearance of righteous indignation as strong as possible. And he made the effort with all his heart, but the appearance of indignation would not come. Something had dissolved in him—something that should have hardened and made it possible for him to laugh defiantly. And it seemed to Charlie Mark that the weakening influence proceeded from the keenly watching eyes of Little Billy, whose face had turned so pale with excitement that his freckles stood out as great dark stains. The boy looked through and through him, and saw into every shadowy corner of his soul.
A trembling hand fell on Charlie’s shoulder, and he looked up into the drawn face of Henry Mark.
“Son,” the old man was saying, “get up and tell him he lies. Get up and tell him he lies before I have to do it.”
Charlie Mark rubbed his knuckles across his forehead as though he wished to brush away the numbness from his brain. The mere exercise of his voice snapped the bond that held him. He leaped to his feet.